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Dance: Pepa Montes. Guitar: Ricardo Miño. Cante: Segundo
Falcón. Piano: Pedro Ricardo Miño. Guest artist: Manuel
Molina. Palmas: Bobote
With the title “Bailaora” (flamenco dancer)
Pepa Montes has been presenting this varied show along with her
husband, guitarist Ricardo Miño and their son, pianist Pedro
Ricardo Miño for several years. Used to be you went out on
stage and danced as best you could, but today’s market demands
“works”, so anyone who just wants to dance without being
bound to a story line has to go in for these generic but non-committal
titles such as Canales’ “Bailaor” or Yerbabuena’s
“Eva”.
good thing about this system is that the product is easily modified
– the bad thing is people don’t come back for more because
“I already saw that show”. On Friday, October 22nd at
the Festival de La Mistela, Pepa Montes enjoyed and suffered both
of those circumstances. Empty seats revealed audience apathy, but
on the up-side, the “work” has gained in dimension thanks
to the insertion of guest artist Manuel Molina who does Manuel Molina,
the same role he played with Farruquito and Manuela Carrasco: singer
philosopher, Greek chorus, guru and godfather. Who doesn’t
know that image of Manuel, arms outstretched like a flamenco Jesus
Christ saying mass? The man fascinates, no doubt about it, almost
going over the top now and again but managing to be credible partly
thanks to original verses that keep you focused (“…so much
to talk about and so little to say…”, “…if only
I were a comb of your hair…”) and the force of his charisma.
The famous “Seville school”
which pays permanent tribute to traditional forms and glorifies
the bata de cola
Another welcome surprise was the inclusion of singer Segundo Falcón,
discreet and sincere, with a clean, sweet voice that achieves some
high-quality moments if we sit back and relax. It was this voice
that opened the show with an interpretation of the caña that
included some interesting personal touches to accompany the dancer
referred to in the title. Pepa Montes is the elder generation of
flamenco dance. At 51 she belongs to the generation of Manuela Carrasco,
Milagros Mengíbar and Merche Esmeralda all of whom, like
Pepa, received their training from Matilde Coral. This is the famous
“Seville school” which pays permanent tribute to traditional
forms and glorifies the bata de cola, an accessory in danger of
extinction and which many young dancers reject as hopelessly cliché.
Ricardo Miño comes on stage and sticks his head inside the
grand piano to address the audience. Apparently there is no other
microphone, but it’s a bizarre image to say the least, as
if the young musician were dialoguing with his instrument. After
saying “good evening” he announces “granaína”.
The music is lovely but the personality of a piano does not easily
adapt to flamenco and it’s a struggle to hear the promised
form. When Segundo Falcón sings some interesting fandangos
de Huelva, the piano seems to suck the life and flavor out of this
cante which is so sensitive to any sort of alteration. For bulerías
the piano is even less convincing despite, we repeat, the beauty
of the music and the abundant palmas. A guitar can kill time playing
compás, but harmonic reiteration without melody on a piano
is heavy-handed, blunt and lacking the shading potential of a guitar.
Pepa returns in a white bata de cola and shawl to dance an old-style
alegrías, but the lady confuses “old-style” with
“old-fashioned”. Manuela, Milagros and Merche, the three
M’s, have all managed to renew their dance within traditional
forms, never content with repeating formulas that worked in the
past, because all artists instinctively know that aesthetic sense
changes no matter what we do, and all too often quality degenerates
into cliché. This is a sensitive topic nowadays when a new
generation of artists is staking a claim on the label “flamenco”
and calling it their own for a wide range of experiments while systematically
rejecting historical precedents. Pepa Montes is the other extreme
and “out of the mouths of babes” we have what one disappointed
audience member said upon leaving the theater: “she reminds
me of those flamenco dancer dolls we used to put on top of the TV”.
Pepa Montes recreates the recent history of flamenco dance, the
decade of the seventies when tourists, both foreign and Spanish,
flocked to the tablaos and between sips of sangría effusively
applauded the fiery heelwork, aggressive palmas, repeated speed-ups
and sudden stops that were the order of the day.
A brief fiesta finale with the participation of an unidentified
female brings us back to the present with excellent bulerías
dancing…imagine if Bobote had danced! As each night, the party
continued at the local peña with a recital by the very young
singer Lidia Montero and the surprise guest spot with Enrique el
Extremeño.
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More information
- Isabel Bayón – 'Del
Alma' - Fernando Terremoto &
Capullo de Jerez - Pepa Montes. Bailaora. Manuel Molina,
Segundo Falcón, Ricardo Miño - Historias de Arte: Matilde Coral, Chano
Lobato…